Dan Hodges is a former Labour Party and GMB trade union official, and has managed numerous independent political campaigns. He writes about Labour with tribal loyalty and without reservation. You can read Dan's recent work here

The day the People Assembled

Yesterday, the people assembled. Not all of them, obviously. Or even most of them. But a couple of thousand of committed souls braved the wind, the rain and the risk of their dreams being tossed and blown, and assembled at Westminster Central Hall for the official launch of the People’s Assembly Against Austerity.

As I joined them, and headed up to the press eyrie in the south rotunda, it occurred to me the last major political event I’d attended here was Labour’s 1995 special conference that had sent the abolition of Clause 4. Most People’s Assembly delegates probably didn’t share my fond memories of that day. Come to think of it, a fair few of them looked as if they hadn’t even been born that day.

That included Owen Jones, the event’s youthful driving force, who arrived sporting his trademark plaid shirt, now more de rigueur amongst the radical Left than the Keffiyeh or V for Vendetta mask. Though in truth most of those present seemed to be preparing for an afternoon strolling on the Fells, rather than the downfall of capitalism, with plenty of Kagools, rucksacks and sensible shoes in evidence.

The one exception was TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady, who took to the stage sporting an elegant grey trenchcoat and knee length boots, a bit like a stunt double for Keanu Reeves from the Matrix. The coat was then discarded to reveal an amazing tropical print dress that played havoc with the senses, and made it look as if the leader of the Labour movement was off to a Seventies tribute gig.

Several more refugees from the 1970s were encamped outside, where the usual bazaar of trestle tables, awnings and tents had sprung up, peddling the pamphlets, papers and flyers that constitute the flotsam and jetsam of progressive socialism. One man from the Stop the War Coalition seemed to be engaged in a vain attempt to explain the dangers of Western imperialism to a group of Japanese tourists.

There was also a strong, if not entirely welcome, showing from the Socialist Worker’s Party. Organisers of the People’s Assembly had claimed the SWP had no role in the event, something I put to one of them. “That’s a moot point”, he said cryptically. Were he and his colleagues actually attending the sessions? “Oh yes. We’re all going in.”

When I asked Owen Jones about this sinister entryism, he responded “They have nothing to do with it. But I’m not a McCarthyite like you. That was a joke, by the way. Say I said it with a wry smile or something.” It was all said with a wry smile.

In the hall itself there was a sense of mounting excitement, if not quite electricity, as banners were unfurled reminding people that “Poverty is Political,” urging delegates to “Unite the Resistance”, and noting the formidable presence of “The Exeter Woodcraft Folk”. Behind the stage a large screen displayed an eclectic mix of live tweets from the conference floor, including my personal favourite, “Always impressed at Morning Star’s coverage of lower league football”. My own effort, “Seeing if I can get this on the big screen”, proved unsuccessful.

Then, just as a tweet popped up from a delegate named Beverley Castle, proclaiming “I totally love Owen Jones”, so did the great man-boy himself. Say what you want about the Justin Bieber of the Left – and I frequently have – he knows how to wow an audience. “Loudly, clearly, defiantly, it is our turn now!” he bellowed. “Yes!” the audience screamed back. Or that may just have been Beverley.

Frances O’Grady called on people to stand up and link arms. “This is solidarity”, she proclaimed, though from my vantage point it looked like the prelude to a rather surreal rendition of Auld Lang Syne. It certainly impressed the comedian Mark Steel, who joked “I thought we were about to go out into the street and destroy the House of Commons”. That got the loudest cheer of the day.

To be fair, at that point the event had a bit of a carnival feel to it. Well, if not quite a carnival feel, then certainly the feel of a quite boisterous north London garden party.

But after lunch the mood turned sour. The afternoon session started promisingly with Tony Benn telling an amusing anecdote about how he’d nearly caused a mutiny on a Second World War South African troop ship by confronting his colonel and insisting on a debate about war aims.

Then NUT general secretary Christine Blower stood up, and, in a speech that may as well have been drafted for her by Michael Gove’s spin doctor, demanded anarchy in the UK. She wanted marches, rallies, flash mobs, direct action, strike action.

And at that, the flaming revolutionary dominoes began to fall. Unite leader Len McCluskey called for a program of civil disobedience and occupations. “Pay your taxes you greedy bastards!” he shouted. The next speaker, John Rees – who according to an Assembly press officer is a lecturer and author – explained how Tories were “lower than vermin” and “we know what to do with vermin”. For good measure he added, “Do you think the Tories should be allowed to be free on the streets of Manchester?”, (an apparent reference to the upcoming Tory party conference).

By the time Mark Serwotka rose to close the event, even he appeared at a loss about how to make his voice heard amid all these calls for the defenestration of the Etonian elite. So he attacked Ed Miliband instead, issued the by now obligatory demand for a general strike, and finished by roaring “Let’s sock it to these vicious ruling class bastards!”

At which point we, the people, dispersed. It would be nice to say we did so with a sense of having witnessed the beginning of something new, or special. But I’d be lying.

To me, it was just the same old people, handing out the same old leaflets for the same old causes. Yes, there was a good turn out, and I suppose a sense of solidarity. But mainly because everyone from the fringes of the Left had been successfully shoe-horned into the same corner of south-west London at the same time on the same day.

There were plenty of calls for “action, not words”. Yet the only tangible action I could see was the establishment of a series of regional People’s Assemblies. These were then tasked with reporting back to yet another national People’s Assembly in the new year. Where, presumably, the eternal cycle of the Left debating itself, reporting to itself, then debating itself some more, would continue.

The only genuinely serious “action” that was proposed came across as ugly and threatening. Several delegates had called for a need to harness hope. But what got the warmest cheers were the calls for mass confrontation and civil lawlessness.